depend upon the choice which may be made of a leader for the
Lower House. Everything points to that as the one crucial business. The
"Two Conservatives" seem to have a special grudge against Mr. Gibson,
perhaps because, unlike Sir Stafford Northcote, he is not too amiable
for his ambition, and has lately been making a formidable bid for power.
Hence we are told how absurd it is to think for a moment of Mr. Gibson.
He is a member for the University of Dublin and might just as well be a
member of the House of Keys or of the States of Jersey. Lord Salisbury
would never have made such a humiliating display over the Arrears Bill
if he had not been misled by Mr. Gibson. Hence it is necessary to keep
the hon. and learned gentleman in the background if the party is not to
be doomed to endless blunders, and driven, sheer beyond the range of
English sympathies.

The attack on Sir Stafford Northcote is conducted with greater caution,
but with the same fell design. We are told that Lord Salisbury's
selection for the leadership on Lord Beaconsfield's death was opposed by
a near relative of Sir Stafford's, and lost by one vote. Then comes the
suggestion that Mr. Disraeli would not have left the House of Commons
for the Upper House if he had not believed that Mr. Gladstone had
finally retired from the leadership of the Opposition. In other words,
had he foreseen the course of events he would not have entrusted the
leadership of the House to Sir Stafford Northcote. There is a vicious
hit in the picture of Sir Stafford sitting between Mr. W. H. Smith and
Mr. Lowther, yielding by turns to the caution of the one and the daring
of the other, and showing himself unequal to the double part. Impartial
observers will, perhaps, admit that Sir Stafford Northcote's chief fault
is a want of backbone. He has not enough of confidence in himself. He
would be a better politician if he were not so good a man. He needs to
be armed either with the power of kicking out, or with imperturbable
composure. This latter is the more useful and more dignified endowment,
but it springs from a sense of self-sufficiency which fails him. If he
had but the gift of epigram he might escape from his tormentors. The
plague of it is that he never succeeds except when he reasons like a man
of sense, and weapons forged on this anvil are too blunt to pierce the
thick hide of impudence.

No evil has befallen Sir Stafford Northcote but such as is common to
men. It seems but th